The sequel to my favourite fighting game (with the exception of Killer Instinct) is just around the corner, Injustice 2.
There’s a lot to look forward to with this new version, the customisable gear system, the continuation of a great comic story, being able to punch Superman in the face after what happened in ‘Batman V Superman’, but the biggest thing to look forward to are the new characters, while there are a lot of old favourites returning, there are just as many, if not more, new fighters entering the ring to take shots at Batman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman, and with DC’s continued mainstream attention with big, if slightly rushed and mixed blockbuster movies, and much better and popular TV shows, the roster for this game is the most interesting and obscure yet, with new DC classics like Captain Cold, Blue Beetle, Swamp Thing and Darkseid.
And of course, with the advent of DLC, that lets us imagine who could be added into the mix after the game has been released, which is exactly what I’m going to do today.
Just to set a rule here, I’m only going to suggest characters that haven’t already been in the first game, so with that, let’s dare to speculate who could turn up to take on the Regime in the future.
10. Ray Palmer aka The Atom
The resident shrinkling of the DC universe, Ray Palmer, aka The Atom may be small, but he can still hit like a pro, which makes it extra scary when you think that he can shrink small enough to crawl inside your ear and walk around on your brain. While he lacks the ability to grow giant and command small creatures like Marvel’s Ant Man, Ray has proved that despite his size, he’s capable of saving the world time and time again, and I would love to see how they utilise his power in a fighting game. While it would be hard to figure out a way to make him playable while still keeping the game balanced, it’s still something that would be amazing to see, and even more great to play
9. Big Barda/Mr Miracle
The lovable super hero couple of the DC comics, Mr Miracle and Big Barda, who are supposedly based off of comic book legend Jack Kirby and his wife respectively, are two members of the ‘New Gods’ from New Genesis, who are dedicated to maintaining peace and harmony throughout the universe, and stopping the plan of their archenemy, the maniacal Darkseid, from their annoying neighbour planet, Apokolips (yes, that is how it’s spelt). Barda is a superstrong and fast bad-ass who was trained under the extremely harsh conditions in Apokolips, and wields the battle amor and Mega Rod (yes, seriously, as if there weren’t enough things to make fun of in comics already) and her New Genesis bred husband, Mr Miracle, was trained to be the worst’s greatest escape artist, and wields the technology of New Genesis, which makes the Hadron Collider look like kitchen microwave. These two are fan favourites, and I feel they could have the potential to be the first dual fighting characters in the Injustice games, similar to Ferra/Torr from Mortal Kombat X, with Barda being the heavy hitter, and Mr Miracle throwing around the technical and trap-based moves, giving them perfect control over the battlefield
8. Mr. Mxyzptlk
While a very unusual and bizarre character in the DCU (and that’s just from trying to pronounce his name) Mr. Mxyzptlk, a 5th dimensional imp, is basically a cartoon character in the DC world, meant to troll with Superman and other superheroes by transforming into anything, messing with the world around him, and cracking jokes at every opportunity. It would be great to see the super-powered George Burns here to contrast with the (mostly) serious world of Injustice, and his Looney Tunes-eske powers going up against characters like Brainiac and Batman, especially if they can get Gilbert Gottfried to voice him again.
7. Johnny Cage
Netherealm Games have made a reputation about having cameo characters for DLC, such as Freddy Kruger, Jason Vorhees, the Alien and Predator in the Mortal Kombat games, and Scorpion from MK in the last Injustice game, I would love to see old JC in the Injustice world, if just for his great one-liners and to see him throw his green force balls at Superman, and then punch Superman in HIS balls…and probably break his fist in the process.
6. Al Simonds aka Spawn
While Spawn may be owned by Image Comics, not DC, his creator, Todd McFarlane, did give his blessing to him appearing in Netherealm’s previous game, Mortal Kombat X, so with that promise left over, it’s not too much of a stretch to think he could be in Injustice 2, which would be really cool. Spawn’s hell-driven powers and vengeance against the demons of hell for cursing him with having to hunt down escaped sinners without being able to see his wife and daughter made Spawn a hugely popular comic character in the 90’s and early 2000’s, and became the most popular Image comics character with the exception of maybe the Max or Shadowdragon. His powers may be rather inconsistent, but there are three things he always had with him, chains, guns and explodey magic, which gives him more than enough for a great moveset, and it would be great to see him slag off the characters with the great quip and retort system that they’ve been implementing into Netherealm games recently.
5. Uncle Sam
This may seem like another odd choice, but believe it or not, USA icon Uncle Sam is actually owned by DC (as a comic book character anyway), and has been in many comics before, most famously Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters, where he fought, you guessed it, Nazis and anti-American terrorists, how does nobody know about these comics!? As such, I think it would be amazing to see Uncle Sam to go up against Superman, two huge American icons finally battling it out, especially since the Superman in the Injustice universe is a murderous dictator, which would give us some great banter between the two.
4. Plastic Man
I’ve always found the idea of stretchy powers on superhero comics to be really cool, even if they are kind of silly, the ability to turn into a human rubber band I think would be amazing (and something that Jim Carey gets to do everyday). As such, I’ve always wanted to be able to experience that in video game form, but it’s never really worked, we got a taster of it with Martian Manhunter in the last Injustice game, but it wasn’t really his main element, which is why someone like Plastic Man would be ideal to experience this kind of silly power in a fight. Plastic Man’s not just really flexible though, his stretchability as a human Stretch Armstrong makes him able to mold himself into any shape he wants, from a ball to a tank, and even once killed a man by hiding inside his stomach by shrinking into a tiny version of himself (so maybe with that, we won’t need the Atom after all, sorry Ray) which would make this guy a ton of fun to see him fight against huge power users and Gods.
3. Malcolm Meryln
This one is a bit of cop-out, since there’s very little Meryln could do that Green Arrow can’t do, but I put him on the list for two reasons. One, I want to see more trick arrows used rather than just fire, ice, electric, bomb and boxing glove; like where the hell is the boomerang arrow? or the doughnut arrow? But the second and main reason, is that I want to hear John Barrowman voice this guy. We need more Barrowman in everything, so why not get him to reprise his role from Arrow?
2. Captain Boomerang
While I wasn’t a big fan of his portrayal in the Suicide Squad movie, Captain Boomerang is still one of my favourite DC villains, and I would love to see how they do him in Injustice, his trick boomerangs, Aussie attitude and goofy outfit would be welcome in the dark, grim world of Injustice. Plus, with Harley Quinn and Deadshot in the game, we can get some great Suicide Squad banter.
1. Deadpool
Ok, I know this will never happen in real life, but, if I had my dream pick, this would be it. The fourth-wall breaking mere with a mouth would be a prefect choice if we could have anyone from the Marvel Universe, hell, we wouldn’t even need a complicated explanation for why he’s in the Injustice universe, we just need him to turn up there, it’s kind of his thing. And while a man who’s just armed with guns and some swords wouldn’t have that much to have to go up against a man who can juggle planets, his sense of humour and lack of caring about who’s he’s fighting against will be the thing that would make it great to see him, especially with the unique pre-fight banter that we now have in the game.
Either way, even if none of these character will appear in the new game as either DLC or in-game choices, I still can’t wait to play the new Injustice 🙂
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